Parc Ferme: Monaco’s F1 Pie in the Sky

The current iterations are too long, wide, and heavy, and their braking distances are too short. DRS doesn’t work because the straight is not long enough.

This is compounded further by a track that produces oodles of battery energy for the driver in front to negate it. Consequently, overtaking is a forlorn hope, with the consequences being certain retirement of both cars or a time penalty equivalent for the survivor.

From a racing perspective, Monaco has been having it large for years. The Grand Prix has been reduced to little more than a seventy-three-lap procession of some of the world’s most technologically advanced and expensive cars.

As a driver, you only have two jobs: stick it on pole on Saturday and be first out of St. Devote, with the car intact, on Sunday.

If you achieve this, then short of divine intervention, victory is in your pocket; a theme that has become more disturbingly common at other venues this year.

The venue got away with it in the 1980s and 90s. The likelihood of a mechanical failure always adding doubt over the final result.

However, with the modern F1 car, computer predictions and materials have conspired to make such an event a rarity. The problem culminated last year, when the only remaining device to upset the order (a compulsory tyre change) was neutered following the now ubiquitous red flag.

This last phenomenon was more of a rarity back in the day when the inevitable carnage was cleared up under double yellows. In summary, a driver versus driver competition has been regulated out of the race.

To address this, a compulsory two-stop tyre change was introduced to make things more… interesting. Dreamt up, no doubt, by a committee for the hard of thinking.

This low-IQ solution lived up to all of its creative promise. Instead of a race where passing was difficult, we got a “see how slow you can go” competition. This tactic was effectively employed to create pit stop space for teammates.

If F1 were a geographical location, it would be this tiny Mediterranean principality. Monaco is the essence of the show – hedonistic, glamorous, a playground for the rich and famous, literally.

Some might say Las Vegas would smell as sweet, but the desert city lacks the heritage and class. F1 without Monaco then, is an anathema, but it requires a creative solution to put the “sizzle back in the sausage”, so here it is: